Chorus Effect in School

By Ann Meier Baker
This past holiday season was filled with choral singing, when holiday concerts in schools, concert halls, places of worship, shopping malls were all in full swing — not to mention all the caroling and sing-alongs. This holiday season everybody was also talking about the singing in the popular television show “Glee.” I am one among the millions of people who tune in Tuesday nights.

But it’s not just “Glee” that is making choirs cool these days. The a cappella singing competition “The Sing-Off” on NBC is shining a light on the popularity of contemporary a cappella singing; choral flash mobs are all over YouTube and choral music is an important element in many of the most popular commercials on the air today.

In addition to choirs being featured front and center in the popular media, teachers across the country are reporting that the “ ‘Glee’ effect” is paying off for their own school choir programs. In a recent poll by the National Association for Music Education, music teachers reported a surge in the number of students who want to be involved in their schools’ choral groups and new ensembles are being formed to accommodate all the interest.

This is the first good news that school music programs have had in a long time and it couldn’t come soon enough. Since choirs, along with other arts programs, have been sacrificed during recent budget cuts, it’s especially good to see student enthusiasm for singing creating more demand that could influence school boards and other decision makers to keep singing in schools.

But being popular with students is not the best reason to support choral programs in schools. The value of singing for kids is both wide-ranging and well documented in research commissioned by Chorus America in 2009. According to both parents and educators who participated in the Chorus Impact Study, children who sing in choruses have more academic success and advanced social skills than children who don’t sing, and parents and educators attribute a significant part of a child’s academic success to singing in a choir.

Choruses are not the only activity most of these children are participating in, yet parents definitively date their child’s improvements in a variety of areas to their joining a choral group. That, and the breadth of benefits described by both parents and educators, argues for a unique “choir effect,” one that isn’t simply replicated by participation in other activities, according to the researchers.

When it comes to grades, children who participate in a chorus do significantly better than children who have never sung in a choir. Forty-five percent of parents surveyed whose children sing state their child receives “all or mostly A’s” in mathematics (versus 38 percent of nonchoir parents) and 54 percent get “all or mostly A’s” in English and other language arts classes (versus 43 percent).

And there’s more. An overwhelming number of parents surveyed in the study reported that multiple skills increased after their child joined a chorus, from more self-confidence and self-discipline, to improvements in memory skills.

Beyond academics, educators and parents surveyed report that children who sing are better participants in group activities, and that singing in a choir can keep some students engaged in school who might otherwise be lost, which resonates with some of the story lines in “Glee” about bridging student divides at the show’s McKinley High School.

The evidence that the “choir effect” provides benefits that can produce a smart and engaged citizenry is compelling. The next time tough school budget choices are made, enlighten your school leaders. Let’s not give in to the Sue Sylvesters of the world.

Ann Meier Baker is president and CEO of Chorus America.